1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a seal, especially a flat, gasket-type seal for placement between two structural machine parts, having an elastomeric sealing member provided with sealing portions, and an associated carrier member, with the structural parts which are to be sealed off being adapted to be pressed against surfaces of the carrier member.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Known seals having a carrier and an elastic sealing member are generally embodied as flat, gasket-type seals, and are frequently used for sealing the housings or the like in the engine construction industry and in the general machine industry. The structural parts which are to be connected to one another are thus supposed to be sealed to prevent the escape of, for example, a gaseous or liquid medium. Since such seals are exposed, amoung other things, to chemical effects, steel alloys (stainless steel V2A or V4A) are used for the carrier of the seal. Such steel alloys require special chemical and/or mechanical, i.e. heat technique, treatment, which is relatively expensive and complicated, in order to achieve a satisfactory use of the carrier material with the material of the sealing member.
The heretofore known seals having metal carriers have the further drawback that when used with machine elements where oscillations or vibrations occur, these known seals can amplify noise in that additional drone-like effects occur at certain resonances. Thus, metal carriers provide no damping effect; rather, at certain resonances, they even amplify vibrations. Another drawback with heretofore known seals is that due to the high electrical conductivity of the metal carriers, the possible applications of such seals is limited, since it is not possible to use these known seals where an electrically nonconducting seal is required, or where an insulator having a low electrical conductivity is required.
An object of the present invention is to improve a seal of the aforementioned general type in such a way that the aforementioned drawbacks are avoided and an economical, mass-producible article is achieved with simple means. Furthermore, it is an object of the present invention to eliminate expensive and complicated preliminary and subsequent processing for the interconnection of the carrier and the elastic sealing member.